Ask a car salesman anything...anything at all.

[Countdown]

Silverbullet767 said:

Countdown said:

Not sure if this has been asked before but why do a lot of adverts show the rear seat belts in the locked position? (i.e. where the buckle is clipped into the holder).

It seems pointless and, if anything, it makes the car look untidy. IMO anyway....

Probably just been though a M.O.T. which would test the rear seatbelts, the tester wouldn't bother undoing them again.

Strange

In umpteen years of having my cars MOT'd I've never had the RSB left in the "locked" position.

[FN2TypeR]

Countdown said:

Silverbullet767 said:

Countdown said:

Not sure if this has been asked before but why do a lot of adverts show the rear seat belts in the locked position? (i.e. where the buckle is clipped into the holder).

It seems pointless and, if anything, it makes the car look untidy. IMO anyway....

Probably just been though a M.O.T. which would test the rear seatbelts, the tester wouldn't bother undoing them again.

Strange

In umpteen years of having my cars MOT'd I've never had the RSB left in the "locked" position.

Quite common in my experience; in fact my last car, a Civic, had the rear belts plugged in at MOT time and they were still in a year later, the rear seats had never been used or folded down!

[Sheepshanks]

FN2TypeR said:

Quite common in my experience; in fact my last car, a Civic, had the rear belts plugged in at MOT time and they were still in a year later, the rear seats had never been used or folded down!

Agree - I'd say (across 3 cars we have being MOT'd each year) they're more often left plugged in than not.

Place I used to work advised us to leave them fastened as we carried a big box of stuff in the boot and supposedly it would help in the event of being rear-ended.

[Countdown]

Fair enough

Maybe my testers never bothered checking!

[renmure]

Well, taking a bit of advice from this thread I phoned the Dealership where I was due to collect my new Type-R from today and explained that, frustratingly, living out in the sticks meant the snow drifts were impassible an anything other than a big 4x4 so I would have to postpone things. They said that I was the 7th cancellation already and the dealership was fairly dead due to the snow but my car was sitting waiting in the showroom.

However, I said I did have a big 4x4 so could come in today and go through all the paperwork and the formality stuff if that was helpful to them so I could just take the car away over the weekend if the roads improved. That seemed to go down a treat and I even got biscuits with my coffee when I arrived. It's nice to be nice.

[ColdoRS]

FN2TypeR said:

Countdown said:

Silverbullet767 said:

Countdown said:

Not sure if this has been asked before but why do a lot of adverts show the rear seat belts in the locked position? (i.e. where the buckle is clipped into the holder).

It seems pointless and, if anything, it makes the car look untidy. IMO anyway....

Probably just been though a M.O.T. which would test the rear seatbelts, the tester wouldn't bother undoing them again.

Strange

In umpteen years of having my cars MOT'd I've never had the RSB left in the "locked" position.

Quite common in my experience; in fact my last car, a Civic, had the rear belts plugged in at MOT time and they were still in a year later, the rear seats had never been used or folded down!

I actually like mine clipped in. Looks neater to my eye.

[loskie]

Any news of customers collecting new cars from your dealerships during this snow and pranging them almost immediately?

[CharlesdeGaulle]

loskie said:

Any news of customers collecting new cars from your dealerships during this snow and pranging them almost immediately?

That's not the kind of story I want to hear.

[Dan W.]

As a customer how do you take being told to go and buy the car elsewhere ?


Just had a customer in with a car wow quote and said if we can make it he will buy from us, had a look at it and even with all the discounts and hitting target and everything else it would lose £600 to actually do the deal for us.

So in a polite way said mr Customer I would go and snap their arm off and do the deal its losing money and we are not prepared to do that, good luck with the purchase if it doesn't work out feel free to come back to us..

You would have thought we had just slapped him round the face with a leather glove, he was so insulted we wouldn't lose money to sell a car he was going to write a letter to the Suzuki to complain we wont do a deal losing deal just so he doesn't have to travel 160 miles to collect this car.

Anyone sales side or customers had similar experience ?

[Mercury00]

I'm not suggesting you're telling fibs, but how do you think the other dealer has managed it?

I've just ordered a new Suzuki actually - I took the price in from Drive The Deal and told them to do their best. I got the car for £13,784 as opposed to DTD's £13,652, but I got 3/4 a tank of fuel and mats thrown in, so not far off at all once those are taken into account.

[Dan W.]

Mercury00 said:

I'm not suggesting you're telling fibs, but how do you think the other dealer has managed it?

I've just ordered a new Suzuki actually - I took the price in from Drive The Deal and told them to do their best. I got the car for £13,784 as opposed to DTD's £13,652, but I got 3/4 a tank of fuel and mats thrown in, so not far off at all once those are taken into account.

They must be losing money, there is no px to over allow on or to move figures around on.

even spoke to our area manager for Suzuki who confirmed they would be losing money so we are at a loss. and to make things worse its a car which is a factory order.

[Fast Bug]

Mercury00 said:

I'm not suggesting you're telling fibs, but how do you think the other dealer has done it

Some cut their throats massively to do a deal, or it could be they've priced it incorrectly.

I see deals that take every penny and more and will politely decline. I've had a few lease quotes this quarter that we were £1000-1500 away from. You never know if they've got some stock they're stuck with and just want it gone, or if they've done a deal with the manufacturer to do a lump of units. We had this last year on some AMG product, we couldn't get close to the prices being quoted and lost a few registrations because of it, the dealer still has some left on 17 plates being punted around. I think that deal bit them in the backside!

[Mercury00]

Actually you can help me with a query, seeing as my dealer is st. Do you know what the lead time is for a Swift SZ-T in Burning Red? I was ignored for two weeks and then told it was at Grimsby, what's in Grimsby?

[Fast Bug]

Grimsby docks at a guess

[Osinjak]

Dan W. said:

...and to make things worse its a car which is a factory order.

Why does that make things worse?

[Dan W.]

Osinjak said:

Dan W. said:

...and to make things worse its a car which is a factory order.

Why does that make things worse?

Pushes the delivery into a new quarter. we are expecting a price increase and as there is a 0% on offer at the moment we cant guarantee that will still be in place.

[Dan W.]

Mercury00 said:

Actually you can help me with a query, seeing as my dealer is st. Do you know what the lead time is for a Swift SZ-T in Burning Red? I was ignored for two weeks and then told it was at Grimsby, what's in Grimsby?

delivery of one should be about 2-3 weeks.


where the new cars are delivered, then its just a matter of waiting for the delivery companies arranging getting it to the dealer.

[mascord05]

Dan W. said:

As a customer how do you take being told to go and buy the car elsewhere ?


Just had a customer in with a car wow quote and said if we can make it he will buy from us, had a look at it and even with all the discounts and hitting target and everything else it would lose £600 to actually do the deal for us.

So in a polite way said mr Customer I would go and snap their arm off and do the deal its losing money and we are not prepared to do that, good luck with the purchase if it doesn't work out feel free to come back to us..

You would have thought we had just slapped him round the face with a leather glove, he was so insulted we wouldn't lose money to sell a car he was going to write a letter to the Suzuki to complain we wont do a deal losing deal just so he doesn't have to travel 160 miles to collect this car.

Anyone sales side or customers had similar experience ?

I did and it's one thats really stuck with me, When the M4 first came out back in 2014, A guy was price comparing me with the outgoing C63 which he had a really great deal offered to him on. I was about 2hrs into this enquiry by this point after test driving, covering most options in detail, i had said early on we wont compete with the C63, as its outgoing model Vs brand new model, When at negotiation i said I cant get close to the C63 to which he replied, ' I thought that was just Sales talk' I said the C63 is silly value for money I'd go and buy it If he likes the car, he stood up shouting Don't tell me what car to buy and told the receptionist i was a st salesman on the way out. To this day still dont understand what happened there

[Dan W.]

mascord05 said:

Dan W. said:

As a customer how do you take being told to go and buy the car elsewhere ?


Just had a customer in with a car wow quote and said if we can make it he will buy from us, had a look at it and even with all the discounts and hitting target and everything else it would lose £600 to actually do the deal for us.

So in a polite way said mr Customer I would go and snap their arm off and do the deal its losing money and we are not prepared to do that, good luck with the purchase if it doesn't work out feel free to come back to us..

You would have thought we had just slapped him round the face with a leather glove, he was so insulted we wouldn't lose money to sell a car he was going to write a letter to the Suzuki to complain we wont do a deal losing deal just so he doesn't have to travel 160 miles to collect this car.

Anyone sales side or customers had similar experience ?

I did and it's one thats really stuck with me, When the M4 first came out back in 2014, A guy was price comparing me with the outgoing C63 which he had a really great deal offered to him on. I was about 2hrs into this enquiry by this point after test driving, covering most options in detail, i had said early on we wont compete with the C63, as its outgoing model Vs brand new model, When at negotiation i said I cant get close to the C63 to which he replied, ' I thought that was just Sales talk' I said the C63 is silly value for money I'd go and buy it If he likes the car, he stood up shouting Don't tell me what car to buy and told the receptionist i was a st salesman on the way out. To this day still dont understand what happened there



I think maybe some customers feel its a sales tactic, but usually we are being honest if we cant compete we will say we cant and why we cant. its not the fact we are rejecting business its just not business worth doing sometimes.

[HTP99]

Mercury00 said:

I'm not suggesting you're telling fibs, but how do you think the other dealer has managed it?

I've just ordered a new Suzuki actually - I took the price in from Drive The Deal and told them to do their best. I got the car for £13,784 as opposed to DTD's £13,652, but I got 3/4 a tank of fuel and mats thrown in, so not far off at all once those are taken into account.

They are relying on hitting their targets, if they do then they will receive back end bonus money; they will likely be trading on that, or it is a misuse of a FON (fleet operator number).

Edited by HTP99 on Saturday 3rd March 13:53